Who: Neil Gaiman, Susan Orlean, William Shatner, Carla Hayden, Charles Bolden Jr., Marlon James, Ann Druyan, Marjorie Liu, more
What: Livestreamed marathon reading
Where: Ray Bradbury marathon
When: Saturday, August 22, free, 4:30 (available through September 5)
Why: “It was a pleasure to burn.” So begins Ray Bradbury’s 1953 novel, Fahrenheit 451, one of the most banned books ever in America. The protagonist is Guy Montag, whose job it is to burn down houses where he finds outlawed books. In honor of the hundredth anniversary of Bradbury’s birth — the novelist and screenwriter (The Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked This Way Comes) was born on August 22, 1920, in Waukegan, Illinois, and passed away on July 5, 2012, in Los Angeles — a wide ranging group of people will read the book online, including writers, actors, scholars, and librarians. The stream begins August 22 at 4:30 and continues through September 5, with such participants as Neil Gaiman, Susan Orlean, William Shatner, Carla Hayden, Charles Bolden Jr., Marlon James, Ann Druyan, and Marjorie Liu reading the three parts of the book, “The Hearth and the Salamander,” “The Sieve and the Sand,” and “Burning Bright.”